Slow Growing Paradise
by InnocentGuilt
Summary: When they said it was better after the Second Wizarding War, they didn't mean easier. Scorpius has a world of hardship and heartache, but he finds that life is a slow growing paradise. Slash, bullying, sad but with happy ending, me as an author.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: So…I have no idea what this is. It kind of took over me one night and I couldn't stop my fingers from typing this out.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I'm only have a bit of fun with the Next Gen.

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His father always says to be himself. Strange, considering Draco Malfoy is nothing if not smoke and mirrors when confronted with anyone other than his own son. His father is never himself, not even in the presence of his mother or his grandmother Malfoy.

Yet always:

"_Father…what if they don't like me…"_

"_Scorpius, my sweet son, be yourself. Don't worry about what they think."_

Those had been the final words spoken between the two of them at King's Cross. They are much kinder than his mother's, who had told him coolly to make the family proud.

He doesn't know how to make the family proud, or whose family who should try to please. The Malfoys have come to value forgiveness as their pride, offering their homes and lands as causes to the war. The Greengrass's, though, their pride comes through respectability and propriety.

The ride on the Hogwarts Express is long and even worse, lonely.

A few students pass his compartment, but when they see his hair, his eyes, his pale complexion so like his father's, they move on, whispering harshly to each other. Some stop, and ask him polite questions, but it's only the lady with the trolley asking if he wants something to tide him over.

He buys a few chocolate frogs with the Sickles his father gave him just for the occasion while his mother's attention had been elsewhere, but he doesn't eat them. He lets them hop around on the bench beside him as he looks at his cards.

_Neville Longbottom_ stares back at him, young and scarred, for the longest time before he gives him a small encouraging smile.

It comforts him a little and he places it in one of his pockets before staring at the cards featuring older wizards with famous names he doesn't quite know the history of. He doesn't see the point in keeping them, but can't very well imagine throwing them away.

When the train stops he leaves them on the bench seat, just in case there's a card collector that wants them.

He disposes of his chocolate frogs, whose animation spells have worn off and only twitch as he picks them up. He tries not to find it sad, because they're only chocolate; they don't feel pain or sadness. They're just spelled candies.

Most of his family comes from a long line of Slytherins. Grandfather Malfoy's family as well as both sides of his mother's family have been Slytherins for as long at least a century, and the only one to deviate from that path on Grandmother Malfoy's side had been her estranged cousin. Scorpius would like not to be estranged, and his father promises he won't be and glares at his mother and grandmother until they agree affably.

He's sorted into Ravenclaw when Professor Featherheart settles the cobbled Sorting Hat a top his head.

His table looks dubious and unwelcoming, but he feels it's better than any other house.

He sits at the very end, and watches the rest of his classmates being sorted. Two names he recognize as his father and grandmother speak of their progenitors with business efficiency when considering galas and charity balls. Potter, Albus and Weasley, Rose.

Potter is sorted into Slytherin, which seems odd to Scorpius, but he's just been sorted into Ravenclaw so he supposes he has no reason to find it outlandish.

Weasley is sorted into Ravenclaw with him.

She sits next to a few older children, who look as if they know her well, and Scorpius tries not to think of the fact he still sits alone.

He remembers his father's words and wishes he had a book to read.

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His classes are simple enough. When he writes home to his parents about them, he feels that perhaps he should fabricate something as he can't imagine how they would be any different from the classes they took themselves. He tries to write about other things, something amusing or, at the very least, marginally interesting, however, he finds that there isn't much he finds humorous or intriguing.

His father and mother return separate letters; his father's full of encouragement and false attention, while his mother's are harder, but somehow no less loving as she writes for him to pay good attention in Muggle Studies, even if it is worthless.

Muggle Studies is actually one of the few classes he finds appealing. No one in his family appreciates Muggle artifacts, but in some of his books his father would buy him when he took Scorpius on business ventures would write about such things like telephones and cinema houses. He never knew what they were, but he'd always wondered.

He also enjoys Herbology and Arithmacy, though he's more talented in Transfiguation and Charms. He likes the simplicity of Herbology and Arithmacy; likes writing with his quill and pushing glove-covered hands into freshly churned soil while Professor Longbottom instructs from the head of the table.

He still doesn't have friends, even two months into the school year and with Halloween putting everyone in a festive mood.

He's often the first one to go to bed, just so he doesn't have to notice how the other five boys seem to be thick as thieves already.

His father tells him in one letter:

_You will find friends, son, but you have to introduce yourself. You are so silent sometimes it is difficult to tell what you want. Perhaps if you were to speak with someone…_

He speaks to one of the seemingly nicer boys in his dorm on the way to Potions—which he is abysmal at—asking what chapter they were supposed to have read, even though he knows they're only on chapter ten.

Alex St. Croix answers that they were supposed to read chapter nine and then calls for Mark Jones, racing away from Scorpius when he has his friend's attention.

He tries a few more times with other classmates, but they are just as inattentive and sometimes rude to him. He curses the name he sports and wishes, fruitlessly, that he looked a little more like his mother. He's irrationally mad at his father for the rest of the day.

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Scorpius meets his very first friend in a bizarre way. It's almost December and he's trying to wrap his scarf around his neck while pushing his books into his bag after Herbology class when Professor Longbottom calls for him.

His struggle becomes more frantic as he calls out, "Yes, Professor?"

The older man, as kind-faced as his impression in the Chocolate Frog card, requests for him to come to his office.

He thinks he's in trouble for long minutes and his heart pounds as he follows his professor to the back of Greenhouse One, where his office is located. He's suitably shocked when Professor Longbottom offers him tea and a scone and says jovially, "You look like a stiff wind will knock you right over."

"Thank you…" Scorpius returns, looking up at his professor with confusion. The scone is light and delicious, cranberry and citrus, and he eats it quickly before taking a sip of his tea, not one to be rude.

They sit in silence for a few seconds as the Professor fixes his own tea and settles comfortably behind his desk, which is strewn with seedlings, mulch, and dirt covered parchments. Scorpius wants to ask what the plants are, but still isn't sure what the point of this meeting is, and therefore is unsure of what to say.

Finally, Professor Longbottom asks, "This is a free period for you, yes?"

He nods.

"Good. I was wondering something at breakfast today…" he says, pausing to take a sip from his chipped cup. "You never seem to sit with your friends."

A flush makes itself apparent on Scorpius's cheeks, but he tries not to duck his head in embarrassment. He's unsure what to say at this point. He doesn't want to say he has no friends. It seems dramatic and in poor taste, and his mother always says that there's no need to be so maudlin when one has such a good life. However, he can't very well lie, or make up excuses as to why he's always alone.

It turns out he doesn't have to say anything though. Professor Longbottom takes a deep breath and nods. "I had feared as much. You seem just as shy as I was myself."

Scorpius honestly can't imagine Professor Longbottom as shy. He's filled with such energy now, always telling stories about the plants and humorous jokes involving the names or purpose. He moves around with confidence and lectures with sweeping gestures of love to his plant children. Not even the scar on his cheek seems to embarrass him, even when one of the crueler Slytherins asks about it point blank.

Professor Longbottom almost seems to read his mind, smiles kindly. "It's true. I was a pretty shy lad back in the day. Just ask your father."

Scorpius is horrified at what comes tumbling out of his mouth in response. "Father says you were a very clumsy boy." Which is also hard to imagine.

He ducks his head quickly, murmuring a heartfelt apology as he stares at the satchel in his lap.

Professor Longbottom only laughs. "He would remember that." He shakes his head, long, unruly honey-brown curls sweeping into his face. He sighs, and looks at Scorpius with something akin to recognition and asks, "Would you like to help me around the Greenhouse? There's a lot I need to get done before lunch."

Scorpius feels it's the least he can do after that atrocity that just left his lips.

It turns out that the Greenhouse is the first place he heads when he has free time, and that Professor Longbottom is a wonderful friend and mentor.

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His Aunt Daphne receives him from King's Cross at the Winter Holidays. His mother and father were delayed in their return from Ireland or, she assures him, they would have welcomed him.

She doesn't speak much, but asks enough to content both of them. She asks about his classes, and what his favorite subject is. He doesn't tell her that it's Muggle Studies, just as he doesn't tell her that as of yet his only friend is his Herbology professor. She would find both to be improper.

She leaves him at Malfoy Manor, in the care of his personal House Elf, Gilly. Gilly had been his only friend other than his father while growing up, and the little Elf hugs at his leg fondly and takes him to the kitchen for some hot chocolate. He coos over his collection of Chocolate Frog cards, which has grown since his ride to Hogwarts in September.

When his parents return home, he rushes to meet them, but halts when he sees them in the heat of an argument.

It isn't an oddity to see them arguing. They seem to fuss and shout over such trivial things. Grandmother Malfoy says that's sometimes how marriages work, but that it was no indication of love or lovelessness in a relationship.

Scorpius isn't always so sure.

They stop when they see him, their ruffled feathers settling when they see their shared joy.

His mother hugs him and says she's glad for him to be home. His father runs his hand through his hair and smiles quietly at him.

They talk of a Christmas festival for one of the orphanages his grandmother had opened shortly after the war, as well as a gala at the Ministry of Magic they were invited to at the behest of his mother's colleague. It's all very formal and stiff, because although they put on a perfect act, it's obvious his parents haven't resolved their argument.

After dinner, his mother asks him to retire to his room.

They yell for almost two hours before his mother breaks down into tears and his father consoles her.

The next morning, at breakfast, their conversations are more realistic.

Sometimes, Scorpius believes what his grandmother often tells him.

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On the return to school, Scorpius is haltingly approached by Rose Weasley.

"Would you perhaps mind company?" she asks, holding her satchel in a vice grip.

He's been so entranced in watching his chocolate frogs hop and play that he almost jumps at the sound of her voice. He quickly composes himself, and offers the rest of his empty compartment to her scooting his frogs into the waste bin hastily.

"Oh, thank you so much." The smile she benefits him with is almost blinding, but even better, it's real. She settles onto the bench across from him and says a little hesitantly. "My cousins are being complete prats. They've locked their compartments and proclaimed it 'Only for Men!'" She snorts and rolls her eyes. "As if they know what being men is remotely like."

He finds his lips twitching at her proclamation.

She looks at him for a moment, smile still lingering on her lips as she reaches her hand across the space between them. "I don't think I've ever properly introduced myself. I'm Rose. Rose Weasley."

He swallows, clears his throat, but reaches out to take her hand in his. "Scorpius Malfoy. A pleasure."

"Now that that's out of the way," she says resolutely. "Did you manage to finish the transfiguration homework over the break?"

Scorpius doesn't manage to stop the groan at the thought of their homework—three feet of parchment over transmorphical spells and their practical uses. "Just barely," he admits.

They commiserate over their homework, and on some level they familiarize themselves with each other, and share vague stories of their holiday break. Rose speaks mostly about her cousins and little brother, and the mischief they got into at Christmas dinner.

Scorpius doesn't really talk about much, but shows her wand-holster his mother had given him for Christmas.

Together they decide that perhaps they aren't well-suited for Ravenclaw, as they find the homework to be taxing more than interesting and their search for knowledge is quite narrowed.

That night at the return feast, Rose sits across from him at their table, chatting contentedly about the torrid affair that is apparently going on between their Defense Against Dark Arts teacher and their Potions Master.

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Rose accompanies him everywhere after the train ride back to school, but he still spends time in the Greenhouses with Professor Longbottom, telling him some stories that Rose shares with him.

He's happy for the first time at school.

Which is, of course, when the other students take a notice of him.

It is apparently unacceptable for a Malfoy to be around the daughter of a hero of the war.

The boys in his dorm call him cruel things.

Whispers attack his ears randomly in Arithmacy.

His cauldron explodes in Potions.

A charm is ill-aimed in Charms class.

Rose encourages him to ignore them, but he finds it hard when his sparring partner in Defense Against Dark Arts class casts a fire-dancing spell along his robes before they had even properly acknowledged each other.

He doesn't write to his father about it. Hardly writes to him at all and blames it on his demanding classes. He doesn't think he could handle whatever advice he would be offered, because right now being himself is the last thing on his mind.

He hides from Rose for two weeks before she gives up trying to stubbornly sit by him.

When she begins sitting by Heather Morton at all her meals, it stings, but the cruelty stops…

Mostly.

Apparently, one cannot be UN-noticed.

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By the end of his first year, Scorpius is ready to beg his father to transfer him to another school, any other school as long it's not Hogwarts.

He's sat silent in Professor Longbottom's office, not saying a word even when he's cajoled and tempted with scones and biscuits.

He's friendless and he's being attacked for reasons beyond his understanding by peers that know nothing about him.

On the train home he wipes at his eyes furiously when tears refuse to abate.

He ignores his parents' concerned looks, and is silent all the way home. Not even Gilly can console him as he tries to find a way to convince his father to let him gather his education at a different school.

He decides being himself is highly overrated.

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InnocentGuilt.


	2. Chapter 2

Scorpius never gets the nerve to ask to go to a different school. He can't think of a way to tell his father about the bullying, due to his own embarrassment or the imagined reaction his father would have. He doesn't even consider telling his mother or his grandmother, knowing that either of them would probably only serve to make the situation worse.

He swallows his nausea at King's Cross. Hugs his mother good-bye, before shocking both himself and his father, by launching into his arms as well. It's a small comfort that he's wrapped in his father's strong embrace before his own shock can even wear off, but then the whistle is blowing and he's running across the platform to find a compartment.

Briefly he sees Rose, but she studiously doesn't see him as he jumps into an empty compartment and locks the door behind him.

There are a few knocks, but he ignores them in favor of staring out the window at the scenery that passes by. When it gets too dark and rain starts pounding against the window, he scoots down on his bench and tries to relax enough to sleep.

He has nightmares about Alex St. Croix spelling his robes off in the middle of Charms class.

When he wakes up, his compartment has been broken into, and he finds that his satchel is missing.

Anger and frustration bubble up in his chest, and he runs to the restroom to make sure they didn't do anything to his person while he was sleeping. It doesn't look like anything, but he rubs at his face with a towel and water for almost a minute before he feels satisfied that nothing is one him. He does a quick three-sixty to make sure nothing is on him.

Then he makes his way through the train, knocking on the doors of other compartments with nausea building in his stomach as he asks the other students if they've seen his satchel.

He reaches Rose's compartment, and she's surrounded by her cousins, the ones she often spoke of when they had been friends.

"I'm sorry," Scorpius says, an embarrassed flush on his cheeks as he glanced between them and the flooring. "Someone took my satchel while I was asleep…do you…maybe know who it was?"

Rose almost looks ready to jump out of her seat and help him search for it, and surprisingly so do the Potter boys, but she manages to remain seated. They all shake their heads negatively and he sighs out a choked thanks.

He doesn't find it on the train.

His satchel didn't really hold much, a few rolls of parchment and quills. However, he had been quite pathetically attached to it.

It's well into the Welcoming feast when he hears a bit of a scuffle behind him. At the Gryffindor table, the older Potter boy is holding Zach Bolton at arm's length easily as he digs under their table.

A few of the teachers are already making to put an end to the commotion, but then Potter comes back up with a triumphant look on his face and a satchel in his hand.

He pats the other kid on the shoulder, and the other staggers in his seat at the force of the blows, before he stands up and lopes over to the Ravenclaw table. He waves briefly at the teachers with a broad smile and a jaunty wiggle of his fingers before he plops the satchel beside Scorpius.

"Think you lost this, mate," he says with a friendly tap of his shoulder, so unlike what he had done to his housemate.

Scorpius stares at it, realizes that yes it is his. His eyes shoot up again to the soft brown of the older Potter boy. Clearing his throat he says quietly, "Thank you."

He quirks a bit of a smile. "Don't mention it."

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Unfortunately, Potter's benevolence is the start of other's malevolence.

He knows of his family's past misgivings—to put it lightly—but he would like to know how he is anything like they were; he would like to know why they seem so intent on believing that his family is anything like the way they were.

The Malfoys have done nothing but help in any way they could after the second war.

Early in October, Scorpius asks Professor Longbottom if something is wrong with him.

It's quite possibly the first time he's seen such a stricken look on his friend's face. "What would make you ask such a thing?"

Scorpius stares at the plant before him that he is carefully trimming like his Professor had taught him. He doesn't know what finally broke him. The others are no crueler than they had been last year, but he's getting tired of it. He's getting tired of not understanding why he can't have friends, or why they can't be nice to him. He's always been cordial with them;_ always_.

He swallows a painful lump growing in his throat and wipes at his suddenly itching eyes with the elbow of his sleeve. "They don't…like me," he says, finally getting the courage to tell someone, an adult. "They…are mean to me. And I don't know why. I thought maybe if there was something I was doing…"

"There isn't," Professor Longbottom says firmly, coming over and handing Scorpius a handkerchief. It takes him a moment to realize that he does have a very hot tear trailing down his cheek. He snatches the cloth away fitfully, scrubbing at his face, while his professor looks at him with such profound understanding. "There's nothing wrong with you, Scorpius. Children can be cruel—people can be cruel—with little reasoning."

Scorpius wishes there had been something wrong with him.

At least then, he would have the ability to change it.

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He writes his father once a day just so he has an excuse to be away from everyone. On really bad day, where he's pushed into a wall or tripped down the last few steps of a stairway, he'll write to his mother. Sometimes he writes to himself, and when he does that he tries to encourage himself. He writes that it could be worse; that they could be publically humiliating him instead of just being boorish brutes.

It doesn't help, but it helps eat up time when his dormmates are down in the Common Room.

His parents always respond promptly to his bland letters. His father asks him how he is, if he's made more friends. His mother asks how his classes are, if he's keeping up with them well. Their letters somehow serve to make him feel worse.

He would much rather be with them than in this horrible place.

He's reading his father's latest letter at the Ravenclaw table one morning, when one of his worst fears comes into fruition.

Alex St. Croix snatches the letter from his fingers, saying with a cruel, mocking smile, "Oh, little Scorpius got himself a letter." He waves it around in the air, and he and his friends laugh when Scorpius attempts to grab it back from him. "Oh and it's from his daddy!" he laughs.

"Stop it!" Scorpius growls, glancing around the Great Hall, seeing all the curious stares. "Please give it back, Alex."

"No, no!" the boy replies easily, keeping the letter out of his grasp. "Y'know,_ everybody's_ been so curious about your father. Let's just have a little peak."

Scorpius swallows, having read the first few lines of his father's worried letter. He tries harder to grab the letter, not wanting to have his father's concern for him waved around as a source for gossip.

Alex reads, easily dodging his every attempt. "My dearest son, Please to not feel that I am unappreciative of your letters. In fact, they are a cause of great joy for me. However, I fear that there is something you are not telling me…"

Someone says loudly enough to be heard by the entire hall, "Aw, he knows you're queer already, Malfoy!"

"You're letters are very informative about your classes," Alex reads on and Scorpius gives up his attempt to snatch the letter back and instead starts to gather his belongings, trying to hastily shove all of his belongings into his satchel. His face is hot with embarrassment, and he feels all the stares against his skin like slime. "Yet I have noticed a distinct lack of any mention in your personal life. You do not speak of any friends or hobbies and to be honest, Scorpius, it is causing your mother and me a great deal of concern…" He breaks himself off to say, "Oh, Malfoy, who knew you had such a caring daddy! He must love you_ very_ much."

The depravity in that statement creeps along Scorpius' skin, making him shudder.

He swallows harshly and scrambles away from the table, trying to ignore as Alex continues reading.

"That's quite enough!" He hears Headmistress McGonagall proclaim, having marched away from the Professor's table to snatch the paper away herself, but he doesn't stay, not even when Professor Longbottom calls for him, having followed the Headmistress to the scene.

He rushes to an abandoned classroom and hides there for the entirety of the day, missing classes and wishing he would just sink into the castle walls.

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For Christmas, his parents give him a fluffy, little kitten with pained, hopeful smiles.

He holds the fuzzy white thing close to his chest, rubbing it softly and feeling something in him loosen when it rubs its head demandingly against his palm.

"We thought you may like it," his mother says, taking a seat next to him. "We hope it will alleviate the loneliness."

He doesn't say anything to her about loneliness. He's become rather well equipped at the art of silence and discretion.

His father sighs and runs his hand through Scorpius's hair, rubbing his neck comfortingly.

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The kitten, which he names Scramble after the kitten scrambles around his room chasing his shadow, does help alleviate some of his loneliness. At the very least, she can make him smile on occasion.

At times, she's the only thing that gets him through the day. She's such a playful little thing and when he takes her to the Greenhouse with him to help Professor Longbottom, she plays with some of the livelier plants, never hurting them, just sort of batting.

Professor Longbottom seems to have made even more time for him, disclosing to him one Saturday afternoon that this level of bullying is something no one should have to go through alone.

Scorpius doesn't say one way or the other about the bullying, but he welcomes the safe haven that the greenhouses give him.

He tries not to be in the Great Hall when a great multitude of students are, his face still occasionally flaring with heat when he thinks of the day Alex St. Croix took his letter. He never opens his mail in public anymore, taking those with him to the greenhouses, but still after the two weeks of detention Professor McGonagall, Alex has taken to personally terrorizing him. He's gathered a few other people, which somehow makes him accessible in all of his classes and puts him constantly on edge.

Scramble is really the only good thing in his life.

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Spring brings a Potter to his defense, and surprisingly it's the little girl who sticks her wand practically up Craig Jefferson's nose, glaring with acidic green eyes.

He's just been punched in his stomach when she comes out of nowhere in a flurry of red and gold, yelling, "That's enough, you hideous ogre!"

Jefferson, he can see through his watering eyes, smirks at her before looking down to him, sneering, "I see you found a skirt to hide behind. Didn't think you'd find a_ girl_ to hide behind, f…"

Whatever he was going to finish that sentence with is lost when Lily hisses something under her breath and he goes sprawling across the hall. She steps over him angrily, her wand never lowering from him. "If you know what's best for you, Jefferson, you'll leave him alone."

He looks indignant and enraged as he glares at her from the floor. "Or you'll do what?"

It's a strange thing to see such a fierce eleven year old girl. It's even stranger when her face melts into distress and she starts sniffling, actual tears springing instantly to her eyes. "Oh…he-he was s-so mean to me and h-he threatened me. I-It was so s-s-scary…" she simpers.

The girl should have been in Slytherin.

She straightens herself to her full height, which isn't much, but he cowers a little when she raises her wand again and says, "Do you really want to make the Savior's_ only_ little girl cry?"

Jefferson sneers at her but scrambles away, leaving them alone in the hall. Potter sighs and sticks her wand behind her ear as she comes towards him, gently helping him up. "Are you okay?" she asks, her eyes no longer blazing, but warm with concern. "It looked like he hit you pretty hard."

He withholds a groan, though he can't control the grimace of pain. "Yes, thank you. I'm fine," he lies.

He feels like he's going to throw up.

Lily dusts off his robes, shaking her head sadly. "You really shouldn't let them push you about like that."

He sighs, takes a step away. He can only imagine what's going to happen to him now that Lily has stepped up for him. "Thank you for your concern, Ms. Potter."

The next day Jefferson has seemingly been ostracized from almost everyone and he's given a few days reprieve from walls and floors and strange class accidents.

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The ride back to London is silent for all of about twenty minutes.

Then four figures come crashing in like they own the compartment and noisily settle themselves on the benches.

The three Potter progenies and Rose settle in, with Lily and James sitting on his bench while Rose and Albus lounge on the opposite one. Scramble glares at them from his lap, no doubt unhappy with the noise level that has just startled her from her nap.

These four have taken to doing this randomly, as if to provide a reminder to his aggressors.

He can't say that he minds. He enjoys there company and the reprieves from abuse. He isn't really comfortable around them though.

The three Potters are loud and obnoxious and seem to yell at each other more than they talk to each other, and Rose is always a sort of referee to them, assigning points and deductions like homework. He doesn't know what to say when they try to include him and having grown so used to the silence he'd wrapped himself in for more than a year…

"Scorpius. Scorpius. Scorpius!" Lily says demandingly, glaring across the aisle at Albus. "Tell him that Exploding Snap is a much better game than Chess."

"Don't you bring him into this!" he retorts. _"You_ are the one supposed to be telling me the_ merits_ of Exploding Snap, so let's hear them."

He has absolutely no clue what prompted this argument, but Lily actually starts counting off ticks on her fingers, looking at her older brother superiorly. Albus' face becomes frustrated as he argues one of her points.

It goes on for five minutes, until James ends the argument, by standing up and yelling, "Now, now, children! I can solve this easily." He paces slowly in the row between the benches and more importantly his younger siblings who stare skeptically up at him. With a finger in the air, he announces, "There can be no argument that Quidditch is by far the best game ever invented!"

The compartment breaks into agreeing cheer, and Scorpius feels himself smile a bit and he pets Scramble.

He feels maybe being at Hogwarts isn't as bad as it once was with these noisy four around him.


	3. Chapter 3

His father and mother argue more that summer, though they do it in hushed whispers and fierce glares.

Scorpius has no idea what's going on, but when he sees his grandmother Malfoy, she only says, "These are tough times on us, darling."

He doesn't understand what she's alluding to, but when he asks for clarification, she only returns to her tea with a sad shimmer in her clear, blue eyes.

No one says anything about what may be going on and the few outings he takes with his parents, they're stiff smiles and polite fondness that seems real but…depressed.

Rose and Lily write him over the summer break, and sometimes they enclose letters from Albus or James, who mostly seem bored with summer more than interested in writing him. He cherishes the letters regardless, learning their penmanship by heart and writing back promptly each time he receives one.

Their letters to him mostly complain about each other he notices. Rose includes letters about her little brother, Hugo, and how her parents are 'all weepy' about his going to Hogwarts. Lily complains about her brothers and every so often about her own mother who continuously comes into her room to 'chat'. Albus bemoans that Lily continues going into his room to hide. And James…James just talks about Quidditch.

His letters to him don't say much, but he doesn't notice until Albus tells him that his letters are bland and really perfect sleeping material. He can't really think of anything specific to write to them. He doesn't want to tell them about his fighting parents, or the strange sad cloud that seems to have settled over the Manor. He doesn't even want to tell them about Gilly, who is teaching him how to make treacle tarts. He just talks about Scramble and the trouble she wreaking on the gardens.

His father takes him to Platform 9 ¾ alone that year, and Scorpius looks up at him trying to decide the change that has marked this man. He's always looked pale but now it seems wrong on him. He looks tired and drawn, bags under his eyes.

He wonders if it's his mother's doing. She seems to always be picking at him.

His father drags him into a tight hug, tighter than he's ever felt in his life, and says into his hair, "I love you, my sweet Scorpius. Truly, I do."

"I love you, father." He looks up again into the solid gray eyes boring into him. Tries to figure out if this is some form of goodbye.

On the train he and Scramble find the empty compartment, and only minutes later he hears James from the hall yelling, "I found the prat! Everyone stop looking!"

Not four, but five people stumble in, looking various shades of relieved to be away from their families.

Scorpius' eyes linger on the new boy, until Rose nudges him in the side, saying, "Well, introduce yourself, ponce."

The young boy glares at her with sharp blue eyes, before mumbling out, "'M Hugo."

He nods, introduces himself and tries to wrap himself up in the dynamic of the Potters and Weasleys, tries not to stare back at the platform where his father is slowly becoming invisible.

.hphphp.

Hugo is sorted into Hufflepuff and Rose, sitting next to him says, "Well, the family has children in every house now," with a fond smile that immediately grows when Hugo turns around to look at her nervously. She waves at him, and Scorpius lifts his hand too, giving an encouraging nod like his father and Professor Longbottom always seem to give him.

Hugo decides that Scorpius is the one to hang out with but oddly, doesn't speak half as much as his sister and cousins do. It seems to be a source of amusement to the Potter boys, who always say they could open a mime school and make a killing. Rose and Lily just chatter at them incessantly.

Alex St. Croix and his remaining posse—the few who haven't succumbed to the strange justice Lily metes out—have taken to calling Hugo his boyfriend. He doesn't let Hugo hear it if he can help it, encourages them to leave the shy boy out of it, and even gets into a scrap with one of the boys. He thinks it's depraved the way they act, the things they say, and he won't have it for someone whose only flaw is to befriend him.

He feels he's doing them a favor really. If Rose or any of the Potters were to hear what the insinuated about the baby of their little group there would be a hell to pay the likes of which Alex hadn't seen before.

He's almost tempted to let them find out, just because he's tired of all this bullying. He's tired of Alex picking on people he doesn't know, just because they're quiet or they don't want to stoop down to his level of mindless cruelty. He's tired of Alex pushing him around.

He isn't quite sure how to stop it though, so does the best he can to ignore it when he can, and take it all when he can't.

.hphphp.

Professor Longbottom greets him with some harder work, but some happier conversations. He says he's noticed that Scorpius seems to be spending time with the Potters and Weasleys.

"I'm glad you found friends, Scorpius, and pleased that you could find friends in them."

Scorpius nods, trying to sooth a plant that's young and broody. Scramble sits on the table next to the plant, her head cocked to the side as if she's unsure as to why the plant is so reclusive. "They…they're very kind to me. But they are sometimes quite loud. I'm not sure what to do with the noise."

Scramble comes over to sniff at the plant, rubbing her face against one of the strong sturdy stalks.

Professor Longbottom smiles. "They come from a large family, Scorpius. Sometimes noise is the only thing they know how to make."

The plant responds to Scramble's attention, vines twisting and the flower turning towards the cat.

Scorpius watches and wonders what it would be like to be that loud all the time. He doesn't even like to talk much, but they are content to talk even when they aren't talking about anything.

"What does your father think about your new friends?"

He doesn't, Scorpius thinks quietly. He and his mother had been too busy arguing to really inquire too deeply about his friends.

.hphphp.

Rose and Albus convince him to go to Hogsmeade with them every time they can. They visit the shops, including their uncle's Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes. It's a fun shop, and they always go to talk to their Uncle George and hear his outlandish stories about Hogwarts. The older gentleman talks about his time with his brother Fred with a fond smile and a sad glimmer in his big, blue eyes.

He asks James about it one afternoon, when they're he's being tutored in Potions—and who would have guessed that James Potter would be so exceptional at Potions.

James just shrugs, tossing his longer auburn hair away from his face. "Uncle Fred died in the Second War. I've never met him, but our family tries as hard as they can to keep him alive for us." He hovers behind Scorpius, his hands settling on Scorpius' wrists to slow his stirring. "One his and Uncle George's birthday grandma Weasley makes two cakes and we take the second one out to the tree he's buried under and smother his tree with the cake."

Scorpius halts in his stirring but James' wrist keep his hands moving steadily. "What an odd tradition…" he muses, helping stir after a few heartbeats.

James hums quietly. "I've never really thought about it. Teddy says they've done it for as long as he can remember and he's almost twenty now. I suppose it's just the way we deal with grief. We make a happy memory of it. Even with Teddy's parents…on their birthday's we take Teddy and Nana Tonks over to their graves and we paint their headstones whacky colours." He shrugs. "Makes their absence seem a little less sharp that way."

He imagines trying to do that to grandmother Malfoy's grave, when and_ if_ she ever dies. He doesn't see how that would help, and rather imagines that she would start twirling in her coffin.

.hphphp.

Christmas break doesn't seem very light and cheerful. The house is still decorated to every degree that it normally is, but his family doesn't talk about going to any of the orphanages and they don't mention attending any galas or parties. Grandmother Malfoy seems to have moved into the East Wing of the Manor.

His mother is almost always in her office.

And father…

His father seems to have taken up residence permanently in the library.

Scorpius spends as much of his time there are possible, trying to keep his sullen father company and encouraging Gilly to bring them hot chocolates and little sweets. His father always smiles at him and they eat quietly together before reading.

Scorpius can almost hear his father reading to him sometimes, like he used to when Scorpius was young and he would take him on business ventures. At most of the portkey gates, his father would settle him on his lap and read a book to him.

In his room, Scramble_ mows_ at him plaintively as he sits on his bed and tries not to feel morose. He isn't sure, but he thinks his parents are getting a divorce…

.hphphp.

After his return, Hugo takes to sitting with him in the library, their visits marked by their silence. He takes comfort in those few hours, where Rose and the Potters are off on their own trajectory of mayhem and he can have his silence with the First Year.

Hugo doesn't seem to ever work on homework, but he never hears of him struggling in any of his classes. Scorpius it seems is beginning to struggle in all of them, even Muggle Studies, which is his absolute favorite. He can't help it. His mind always seems to gravitate home, and he wonders what his parents are doing, how his father is.

He finds himself writing to his father a little bit each day, just trying to find the words to say to him, the sly clever words that will extract the truth from him. He usually ends up with parchment of disjointed sentences that he sets aflame on the steps of Hogwarts.

.hphphp.

On the first warm spring day, Lily and Rose decide imperiously that they should have a picnic.

They send Scorpius and Hugo off to get a large blanket from Professor Longbottom. How they knew he had one, Scorpius may never know. Those two seem to know more about the workings of the staff than the staff do.

The Professor smiles as he hands over a large picnic blanket and a basket of fresh apples from the schools personal gardens, and sends them on their way.

They're halfway to the lake when Alex St. Croix and a few of his friends stop them. Scorpius tries to send Hugo on his way with the basket, but Hugo stays, stubborn and glaring at the four perpetrators in front of him.

"Aw, this is so sweet," Alex spits. "Are you taking your boyfriend out for a date, Malfoy?"

Scorpius glowers at him. "Leave him out of this, Alex."

"That's too cute. The little queer is protecting his love."

The other boys snickers and Scorpius again tries to push Hugo along towards the other four, who are coming from the castle with foods extracted from the kitchen elves. He would prefer not to have a huge confrontation, and honestly just doesn't want Hugo to hear any of this filth.

But all the Potters and Weasleys must have been trained to stand their ground, and, failing that, seem to have mastered the art of cutting people down to size.

Hugo, quiet, shy Hugo glares at Alex with hard, brown eyes and asks innocently, "Are you jealous, St. Croix?"

The snickering stops instantly as they stare at the young Hufflepuff. Even Scorpius is impressed, but Rose and the Potters are coming up on them rapidly, and Lily and Rose look thunderous, while Al and James are extracting their wands in preparation to do serious damage—and he's seen them in dueling club; they are a formidable team.

"What the hell are you talking about, Weasley?" Alex fumes, his face seeming to do a strange mixture of draining and flushing at the same time.

Hugo shrugs, like he hadn't really thought about it, but he says, clearly and without remorse, "You seem to be very interested in who Scorpius may or may not be seeing. I just wondered if you had an explicit interest in him."

"You know, he's right," James says as he comes to wrap his arm around his little cousin, his wand still held tightly in his fist as he glares at them.

Scorpius looks around and sees Lily and Rose spreading behind the bullies, wands hidden in their robes. Albus is coming to stand beside him, his green eyes so much like his sister's when they glitter with promises of pain.

"You do seem to be quite infatuated with Scorpius. Are you sure you wouldn't like to ask him out?" James continues, tapping his wand against his jeans' leg.

Alex and a few of his friends go for their wands at the insult, but Lily and Rose come down on them with their wands drawn, just as Albus and James lift theirs.

"I wouldn't do that, were I you," Lily hisses. "Leave him alone from now on."

"Or you'll have more to worry about than your repressed crush on Scorpius," Rose finishes.

Alex looks between them all, his eyes wide and angry. "Your parents must be so proud of you…harboring the demented offspring of a Death Eater."

Albus smirks. "Quite proud, actually. Shoo."

And they do. Alex leads his gang away, back towards the castle. Those with their wands out return them to their holding spots—Lily's behind her ear; Rose's in her sleeve; James' in his back pocket; and Albus' in his robe.

Scorpius stares at them for a moment, before asking, "Do you always practice battle tactics or is it something you inherited."

James smiles and slings his arm around his shoulders. "When playing_ hide and stun_ with older cousins who have a larger knowledge of spells…you learn to strategize before attacking."

Scorpius once again wonders just what it would be like to have so many people that you lived on a precarious balance of love/hate with.

.hphphp.

The ride home is noisy and loud and Scorpius finds himself smiling more often than not.

Rose and Albus decide they should try to see a few amateur Quidditch games over the summer, and ask if Scorpius will be able to go.

"I think I may be able to," he answers with a slight nod, inspecting his new Chocolate frog cards. He thinks he'll keep Albus Dumbledore, but he really isn't too sure if he wants to keep this Scamander fellow. He looks a bit…dodgy.

"You should," James decides, looking at his own cards and tossing a card of Luna Lovegood at him.

He wants to. He likes having friends and he…he loves these five, who seem so vested in his happiness.

But it will depend on the status of his father.

He doesn't want to leave him alone too much.


	4. Chapter 4

The summer is marked most noticeably by the fact that his father is admitted into St. Mungo's.

Just shortly after his father's birthday, his mother wakes him in the dead of night and hands him some well pressed outing robes, which he dresses in quickly, not knowing what was going on. He wonders if she's taking him, but when he comes out with Scramble held tightly in his arms, she says gently, "Scorpius, you can't take animals to St. Mungo's. It's unsanitary."

He feels his heart practically explode in his chest.

That's how his mother breaks the news that grandmother Malfoy has taken his father to the emergency ward. They arrive a few short minutes after his father is properly admitted, and his grandmother stand speaking with an average height medi-wizard who looks remarkably like an older Albus.

"When did his symptoms start acting up again?" the medi-wizard asks.

His grandmother cuts her eyes over to his mother, who sighs wearily. "They've gotten worse within the last few months. He continued to take his potions like you prescribed, but he wouldn't rest like you recommended."

The medi-wizard frowned and muttered something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like, "Of course he wouldn't listen to me…" He looks down at the clipboard in his hand. "The other medical staff is prepping him for a transfusion. I just need you to fill these forms out for me. I'll be back when in a few minutes to collect them."

The papers go to his grandmother who goes to take a seat at one of the tables in the waiting room. His mother stands still, her sea-green eyes off in space.

"For Merlin's sake, Astoria! Sit!" she barks after a few seconds.

His mother snaps back to herself and takes a seat. "I didn't know it had become so bad," she whispers.

Scorpius feels his lips turning down in a cruel frown as he listens to the two women in his life talk about something that has apparently afflicted his father since Scorpius was three. His eyes begin to sting and his throat gets a lump in it and he backs away from them, sneaking easily into the maze of St. Mungo's halls.

His father doesn't see him off to Hogwarts and neither does his mother. They're both still in St. Mungo's where his father has been since the first week of July. His Aunt Daphne ships him off with an austere peck on the cheek and a pat on the shoulder.

He's happier that way. He's been so angry with them, he's not sure he would be able to keep from glaring, from saying something hateful and inappropriate.

The ride to Hogwarts is loud as usual as the Potters and Weasleys file in, but Scorpius feels like his ears are stuffed with cotton.

.hphphp.

His cauldron explodes and James has to yank him away from the debris, throwing them both the hard stone floor, and covering Scorpius' head as best he can.

"Lady preserve me! Scorpius, what the hell were you doing?" James growls as he releases his head and helps Scorpius to his feet. When he meets James' eyes, they're wild with confusion and concern as he stares down at him. "Were you even in the same time-realm as me?"

Scorpius shakes his head. "I apologize, James. My head's been elsewhere as of late."

The older boy, newly minted captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, stares at him worriedly, but Scorpius waves it off and turns to begin cleaning up his mess.

.hphphp.

Rose and Hugo come settle by him at breakfast one morning, and Hugo brandishes something small, square and black. "We told our Grandpa that you liked Muggle Studies," Rose says with a large smile. "I remembered you being very interested in the telephone bit, so he scrounged about and this is what he found."

Hugo picks up where she left off, holding the black thing out for him to take. "It isn't a regular telephone. This is actually a mobile. You see…" he fiddles with something on the side and the screen blooms into life of blues and whites. "And then it has these little buttons. Apparently all these mobiles have built in numbers, like the floo system. You press these buttons…and…"

There's the sound of a tinny bell through the phone, twice, before a strange distorted voice greets them.

"Hello!"

Scorpius looks up and a round when he hears that the voice originated in the room. From the Slytherin table, Albus waves his hand, another little black box to his ear.

"Say something, Scorpius. It's great fun."

"Er…hello?" he says haltingly into the phone.

"See?" Rose says giddily. "Isn't it neat?"

Scorpius nods, then returns to his breakfast. "It was very kind of your grandfather to take such a vested interest in me. Thank him for me, will you?"

Hugo looks at him sadly. "You could fiddle with it more if you wanted."

He looks at them, feels bad for not being more interested. "I…I have a lot of homework to do, I'm afraid. I have to finish breakfast quickly so I can work on Charms a bit before classes."

They don't look like they believe him.

He doesn't blame them.

.hphphp.

Lily sits with him at the first Quidditch game of the season, wrapped in her Gryffindor reds and golds while Scorpius has his duel flags, one green and the other scarlet. Rose is off with a boy she's been flirting with, smiling with her arm linked through his and Hugo is over on Hufflepuff's side of the pitch, sitting with a few boys that are in his year.

He's been watching James guard the goal posts for the last ten minutes, not really taking in what the Keeper is doing, but just following him.

The crowd erupts into cheers as Geordie Darnell, a sixth year Gryffindor scores past Audrey Aimes, Slytherin's Keeper. At least that's what Scorpius assumes. No one's rushing to the field yet so the game can't be over.

He tries to keep his mind clear, but it's so bright out today and it reminds him so much of the cruel, unyielding lights in St. Mungo's.

"Scorpius!" He startles and turns to Lily's sharp green eyes and unimpressed frown. "I've been calling your name for two full minutes, now. Dear Merlin, what has gotten into you lately? You've been off since we came back to school."

Scorpius shakes his head, his white blonde hair whipping into his face with the wind. "Just some things at home."

She looks at him calculatingly and he thinks, not for the first time, that she should have been in Slytherin with her older brother. "Do you want to talk about it?" she asks.

"No, but thank you." When it doesn't quell her stare, he takes her hand. "Really, it's trivial."

.hphphp.

He takes Scramble to the greenhouses as he normally does, but this time is much different. It's the dead of night, and just before he's supposed to return home to the Manor for the Holidays. He hides away in the back, where all the pots and potting soils are kept and he makes himself a little nest with his winter cloak.

It's warm in the greenhouse, as it should be for the plants but he still shivers and holds Scramble close to him, rubbing his face into her soft white fur.

He's been coming here every night since the beginning of December, loving the solace and green-tinted stars of the winter night. He comes here to think, to try to come to terms with the fact that his father is dying and has apparently been doing so since he was a toddler. It all seems to come to a head today when his mother sends him a letter saying that his father will be on bed-rest the entirety of the Holidays.

He hates that it's come to this. His father is a very active man, always trying to participate in one of his charities, fundraisers, or orphanages. In the last year and a half it seems that he's been homebound and stationary and suddenly all of the memories of he and his father in the library, silently reading together, staying so still together are too much.

He holds Scramble to his chest and lets his hot tears fall into her fur.

Choking on shuddering breaths, and muffling sobs into his cat, he doesn't hear the soft boot-falls coming closer to him. He nearly jumps out of his skin when a large hand settles on his head, brushing at his hair. "Thought you might be here," a familiar voice says, softly.

He jerks his head up to meet the shadowed features of Professor Longbottom. His eyes are kind and understanding as he takes a seat next to Scorpius. "You had your friends in tangles when you ran off from the Holiday feast. James came to ask me if I might know where you were."

Scorpius sometimes forgets that Professor Longbottom is James and Lily's Head of House.

"I didn't mean to worry them," he said, trying to discretely wipe his tears away.

"It's in the nature of friends to worry," the Professor says. "You had me worried, too."

Scorpius looks up at him, his first friend, and sees sadness there as well as understanding. Sadness in his understanding.

Professor Longbottom clears his throat, and he seems nervous for the first time that Scorpius has ever known him. "I wrote to your mother…when your grades started slipping." Scorpius feels a small flare of anger rise within him, but his professor staves it off, saying softly, "You had me very concerned. You seemed even sadder than you did in your first year."

They sit in silence for a few minutes, broken only by the sounds of the young Fourth Year's muted sniffles.

"You know your father's medi-wizard is a very talented man…" Professor Longbottom says haltingly. "And he's very dedicated to his patients. I would imagine that's why your father went to him when the poison became immune to the anti-bodies his first physician gave him."

Scorpius nods, not really feeling enlightened by the words.

The man sighs. "That's not really helpful. I know. Look, I'm just a Herbologist. I dabbled in Auror training for a few years, but I'm better with plants. I don't know much about Potions. That's your father's strength. Hell, even James surpassed me in his second year here. I do know what it's like to have parents in St. Mungo's though. I know what it's like to be mad at them even when they have no control over it…"

"They never told me!" Scorpius breaks in suddenly, feeling the anger his professor had just been talking about cloud his vision with even more tears. "He-He's been_ dying_ for eleven years…and_ no one_ told me. He-He never told me and I th-thought we told each other everything!" He swipes at his face scornfully, but more tears fall into Scramble's fur. "Why didn't they_ tell_ me?"

Professor Longbottom puts his arm around Scorpius' shoulder in a one-armed hug. "They probably didn't want it to loom over your times together, Scorpius."

He wants to say more, but finds he can't. Instead he leans over and puts his face in his professor's shoulder, crying out at the unfairness of it all until he's just out of tears and anger.

.hphphp.

His father calls him into his room on Christmas morning, and Scorpius takes a deep breath and thanks Gilly for the knowledge.

He dresses in casual robes, worn as soft that he had made specifically for his time around the Manor, and marches to his father's room. At the door his grandmother is waiting for him. She reaches for the collar of his robes and straightens it, her eyes misty and loving.

"You have every right to be upset, my sweet Scorpius," she says morosely. "But we didn't withhold the knowledge to harm you."

He steps away from her thin, manicured hand. "I try to understand that, grandmother. It's just…difficult, at the moment."

She nods but says nothing further, opening the door for him. He enters his father's room, and sees the man, pale and drawn, sitting on his chaise laxly. If it weren't for the sheet-white countenance, the dark bags under his eyes, or the large collection of potions bottles on his father's bedside table, Scorpius may have been able to believe his father was fine.

"Scorpius," his father greets as he rearranges himself to make more room for him. "Thank you for coming."

He meets the man's silver gaze, and tilts his head in acknowledgment, making no move to sit by his father.

The older man sighs. "I know you're absolutely incensed with us, son, and I can't blame you in the slightest. I can't imagine how I would feel if I found out your grandmother were dying the way you found out about me…"

"So, you_ are_ dying, then?"

There's a long, pregnant pause as his father regards him sadly. "Potter seems ever-hopeful that he's right on the edge of a cure, but as of right now, I don't believe he will find it in time…if at all."

Something in Scorpius' heart crumples even further than it had in his time at Hogwart's this year.

"I understand you're angry."

Scorpius cuts in rudely, glad his mother isn't around to admonish him, because at the point he thinks he's spent too much time with the Potters and Weasleys. He might just lash out at her with all the impropriety of a commoner. "No, you don't! You don't understand one bit about my anger. Like you said, you can't imagine how you would feel if you found out grandmother was dying the way I found out about_ you!_"

"Fair enough," his father concedes. "I made the decision when you were five, not to tell you. The potions were working well at slowing the poison's progress, and up until last year it seemed that I was fine. I saw no reason to worry you. I didn't want you to send your nights wondering if you would wake with a father."

"Oh, you thought a surprise-death would be better?"

"No, Scorpius," his father says sternly. "I would have told you last summer. I had an appointment set up about a week after I went in, and I would have told you once I had a definitive answer."

Scorpius sniffed. "And what is this definitive answer?"

His father looks at his hands, pale and skeletal. "If Potter and his team can't come up with a solution, I have a year, two on the outside."

Scorpius nods and leaves the room, heading for his stationary.

He writes M.W. Potter several letters, but can't find it in him to send any of them.

.hphphp.

When he returns to Hogwarts, he begins hiding away again, spending free time in the greenhouses and empty classrooms. He finds the emptiness a hollow-comfort but one he can manage as he and Scramble hide away in the room. Scramble plays with dust bunnies and rubble, while Scorpius begins writing letters again, to his father, to his mother, himself, his friends, and tens upon tens to M.W. Potter.

His grades are slipping to abysmal levels, and sometimes Professor Longbottom will keep him after class and ask if he would like to talk about it, if he would like tutoring, or perhaps if he should seek out Headmistress McGonagall for a counselor. Scorpius declines gratefully, but says he's managing, and he is. He's staying afloat, if just barely.

His friends corner him when they can, but mostly he brushes them off. He doesn't want to look at them and see his father's medi-wizard, doesn't want to have a fit of anger and blame their father or uncle for his father's state, because there have been moments when he felt his father would be fine again if only M.W. Potter were_ smarter._

It's almost April, and closing in on his fifteenth birthday, when James wanders into his hiding place in an abandoned dungeons classroom.

Scramble goes bounding over to the newcomer, and from his place in the darkened corner of the classroom, he sees James pick her up, saying, "Fancy meeting you here, Scramble. Where's your wizard?"

She_ mows_ and looks over to the corner he's sitting in.

"Mm, thanks, girl. You're ever so helpful." He settles her on the floor again and meanders his way through desks, chairs, and dust to settle down beside Scorpius. "Y'know, the girls are going to put a tracking spell on you, you keep this up."

Scorpius smiles painfully. "'M surprised they haven't done so already. I mean you found me."

James grinned mischievously. "I have my own ways." Then the smiles dims and James takes a deep breath. "Look, Scorpius…I'm not one for pouring out feelings. Albus is the girly-boy. However, something's been bugging you all year. Now I understand if you don't want to talk about it, but could you drop us a hint, so we'll know why we're suddenly all so horrible?"

He shakes his blond hair out of his face. "You're not horrible. None of you are." He takes a deep breath. "My father is…sick…dying."

"That's terrible."

"Mm…he's been like this for eleven years apparently. I didn't know until last summer," Scorpius continues. "He says he has a year, two on the outside if his medi-wizard doesn't pull out a miracle soon."

"I'm so sorry." James wraps his long fingers around the back of his neck, rubbing at his tense muscles.

Scorpius leans in the tiniest bit. "Yeah. Your father is his medi-wizard," he admits softly, closing his eyes when the fingers pause. "I've been avoiding you because I'm horrible, really. There are moments, where I'm angry at everything."

"That's not too hard to get," James comforts, his fingers working the tendons again.

"Yeah, well…there are moments where I get angry at your father. I get mad that he's not smarter and I blame him for my father being sick. I just don't want to take it out on you or the others."

James sighs, picks up a few of the letters that Scorpius has scattered around him and hands them over without even glancing at them. He waits for Scorpius to organize them and settle them in his satchel before he pulls them both up, proclaiming, "Well, thanks for the consideration, prat, but I for one can take your anger and I bet you two galleons I can have you laughing within five minutes."

It turns out that he can take Scorpius' anger, but it takes him ten minutes to have him laughing and his brother has to help him.

.hphphp.

On Platform 9 ¾, Lily and Rose hug him fiercely, telling him in all seriousness, "Have a good summer, and let us know if there's anything at all that we can do to help. Alright? Even if all you need is a muffin, just let us know and we'll have grandma Weasley whip you up her famous double-chocolate cupcakes!"

Albus rolls his eyes at them. "I don't think you'll have to worry about feeding him, Lils. He probably has an army of chefs at his disposal."

James puts his arm around his brother's shoulder, and says with a crooked smile, "You know it's not the same if love isn't in it, Al. Let the girls feed him, and we'll send him practical stuff…y'know, like Extendable Ears."

He smiles thankfully at them and gives Hugo, Al, and James brief hugs and promises to write them all. He also promises that he'll try to make it to some of those amateur games they're always mentioning.

They split up, returning to respective families. Scorpius turns around and heads towards his ride…his mother and father who wait for him.

They're holding hands, which is the first public display of affection he can remember his parents enacting in years. He remembers all their fights, and all the times he blamed his mother for his father's downtrodden appearance and wonder if she wasn't yelling about him overtaxing himself. He wonders if his mother is the reason he's had his father for so long.

Astoria Malfoy may not be overtly affectionate, but grandmother Malfoy always said arguments had no bearing on the amount of love in a relationship.

He greets his mother and father with a hug.

He's not angry anymore and he has all of his friends to thank for that.


	5. Chapter 5

Most of the summer before his Fifth Year is split three ways between St. Mungo's, the Manor, and Godric's Hollow.

He stays quite a bit with his father, and helps his mother and grandmother in any way he can, but there are days after one of his father's appointment, where Mrs. Potter will show up with James, Albus, and Lily and he'll spend the weekend with them. The Potters do their best to keep his mind off of his father, taking him to amateur Quidditch games—where he finds that Mrs. Potter is the most aggressive Quidditch fan in history—and sometimes they'll take him to local plays in the wizarding town not too far away from their land.

It's…it's not a good summer, but it's better than he would have imagined a year before when he first found out about his father.

M.W. Potter, who insists that Scorpius call him Harry, thinks that he may have found a regimen that will delay the poison enough for him to find an actual cure. He says he has a friend who just happens to be one of the best Potions Masters in history in Germany who's working on the base of the poison, and that if his friend can figure out the main ingredients then Professor Longbottom should be able to find some plants to counteract the poison.

Scorpius has hope, but sometimes when his father is in pain, his face scrunched up and his jaw set, he'll say, "Potter is a daft git with a hero-complex."

Scorpius rather likes M.W. Potter's optimism.

Mrs. Potter and Mrs. Weasley—Rose and Hugo's mother, specifically, as there are_ several_ Mrs. Weasley's—take him to King's Cross that year. He finds the two mothers to be odd, very different from his mother, as Mrs. Potter points at James, Albus, and Lily and says, "I don't want to hear about any pranks unless you have E's in all of your classes. James, you need to focus in your Transfiguration if you want to get into a good apprenticeship. Al, you have your O.W.L.'s this year. I expect fabulous grades in all of them, but will understand if your Charms are a little low. I know how you struggle with that class. Lily…Lily, darling, try not to scare all the boys."

Mrs. Weasley—"Just call me 'Hermione,' Scorpius. It'll be easier."—gathers Rose and Hugo around her and then points and Mrs. Potter. "What she said."

Mrs. Potter rolls her eyes, before she locks her gaze on him. "Scorpius, come here." When he hesitates, she waves her thin hand, her bracelets jingling impatiently. She brings him away from the group, and smiles at him, sweet and passed down to all of her children. "Scorpius, I understand that these are hard times for you and your family. However, school is important and your O.W.L.'s are this year, too. Focus and if you need any help just let your friends know, alright?"

He nods with a small smile on his face. "Yes, ma'am."

Her smile widens. "There's a good lad. Now. Off with you all!"

James and Lily grab hold of Scorpius' robes and drag him away, Lily asking quietly so as her mother won't hear, "What did she say?"

"She didn't…scare you, did she?" James inquires from his other side, grimacing as he casts a glance over his shoulder.

Scorpius just shakes his head with a roll of his eyes, completely oblivious to the tingling sensation along one side of his body. "She just gave me a bit of a pep talk."

.hphphp.

His mother begins writing him almost every day. She writes for both herself and his father, because his father is having troubles with his fine motor skills.

When he receives the letters, Rose and Lily beg him to read them aloud to him, so that they can keep up with how he's doing as well. So they go out to the lake with Scramble and he reads the letters far away from the attention of everyone else.

Since the strategic attack orchestrated by the Potters and Weasleys the bullying has all but stopped, but he still can't get the image of Alex St. Croix snatching his letters out of his head. So they venture to the lakeshore, sometimes one of the boys will come along, but mostly Hugo has settled down into a group of friends that are separate from their group, and James and Albus seem to be hosting a small, friendly war between Slytherin and Gryffindor.

Oddly, he doesn't mind sharing any news his mother can share with his friends. A year ago he wouldn't have imagined this, but now that they all know, have seen him at his lowest, he can't imagine not sharing what his mother and father have to say.

.hphphp.

"I brought you something," James says as he enters the Potions room they use for tutoring.

Scorpius jerks his head up just in time to see the eldest Potter toss a hastily wrapped package his way. He only barely manages to catch it.

"My grandpa sent it to me. I thought you may enjoy it," James says, taking a seat at the table across from him. He smiles encouragingly, sweet like his mother's and excited for Scorpius. "Well…go on. Open it."

Scorpius does as he is bid and unwraps his unexpected gift, discarding the paper quickly as something small falls into his palm. He stares at his new gift curiously, before looking over to his tutor. "What is it?"

James smiles, beguiling and sweet. "That, my dear Scorpius, is a rubber duck."

Scorpius looks down at the thing and then over at the older boy again from under his lashes. "I've heard of them…but what do they do exactly?"

James smile falters and Scorpius feels something in his chest falter as well. "I honestly don't know. Dad says they keep you company in the showers."

"Ah," Scorpius says, though he still isn't entirely sure what its purpose is for. "So, it's like a guardian?"

"Either that or a peeping fowl." James shrugs. "All of the grandkids have one. Grandpa Weasley thinks they're the best baby shower present."

He nods and looks down at his new gift. It's yellow with and orange beak and when he squeezes it, it squeaks disapprovingly. It also has a little sailor's hat on its head, which makes Scorpius smile. "Thank you," he says, staring at his prize for long moments before looking up at his friend.

James clears his throat, waving his hand nonchalantly.

.hphphp.

Professor Longbottom is always available to him, even though he isn't Scorpius' Head of House. That title actually goes to their Transfiguration Professor. When Scorpius is down, though, he always leaves his office open and seemingly never runs out of scones or biscuits.

He's never been so glad of it as he is one morning in November when he wakes up from what, admittedly, isn't his first sexual dream, but it's the first one he's been…not with a member of the opposite sex. He doesn't have many carnal dreams. Usually his dreams are of tea parties with Hippogriffs and art lessons with mermaids. But when he does have wet dreams, he's almost positive they've always been with…with women.

But lately, at least in the last three weeks, he's had fantasies featuring the male persuasion.

Scorpius is so confused.

It isn't that he's really ever been more fond of one gender over the other, but he had thought that it was perhaps normal to not notice until he was older, and then when he had hit puberty, he thought that perhaps it was all of the stress at home that kept him from simply_ seeing_ the opposite sex.

Of course he thinks Rose is a gorgeous girl, with her long red hair, easily teased into a curly ponytail, and loving brown eyes, but when he looks at her he doesn't feel attraction. He doesn't even feel attraction with Lily and he'll admit her green eyes are quite beguiling and she has the easiest smile he's ever seen.

He isn't interested in any of the girls at Hogwarts really.

He locks himself in Professor Longbottom's office, ignoring classes for the morning until the Professor comes in, looking momentarily shocked, even though he had seen Scorpius rush in.

"Scorpius," he calls worriedly, coming to the other side of his desk. "What is it? You father…?"

"He's fine," Scorpius says quickly, suddenly feeling bad for worrying his professor. "I, er…I have a question."

Professor Longbottom lets out a relieved whoosh of breath, sitting down heavily in his desk chair. "Alright, then. Let's hear it."

Scorpius takes a few moments to himself to gather the courage to ask what he wants. Professor Longbottom waits patiently, thankfully. He's used to Scorpius, and he knows he'll speak when he's collected himself.

"Okay," Scorpius says. "I'm sure this will sound quite strange, but, erm…how do you know if…if you," here he drops his voice lower, and nearly becomes unintelligible as he finishes, "like girls?"

Professor Longbottom stares, takes a deep breath, before smiling humorously. "Oh, Merlin. Don't scare me like that, Scorpius."

"This is serious!" he exclaims and the Professor straightens up.

"Of course. Of course it is. I'm sorry," he amends holding his hands up in surrender. "Okay…what started this?"

Scorpius flushes. "There have been…Well, I've been having these dreams."

"Okay…"

"And they haven't exactly been featuring…girls."

Professor Longbottom nods. "Are you attracted to girls?"

Scorpius ducks his head. "N-Not that I…Well, it seems…I just thought that…It took me so long to find friends. I didn't know if it was normal or not to feel drawn to someone when I had troubles having friends…"

The professor puts his hands up, effectively stopping the tirade. "Calm down, Scorpius. There's nothing wrong with any of this. It hardly matters who you're attracted to. But perhaps you should…try to decipher which sex you're attracted to before you start stressing."

"But I don't know how to tell!" the young man shouts.

"Who do you like?" Professor Longbottom asks.

He sees auburn hair and brown eyes dance behind his eyes, but doesn't say anything about it either way.

.hphphp.

He spends the Holidays with his grandmother Malfoy, and spends a few days over at Godric's Hollow after New Year.

His father has started his new potions regimen, and M.W. Potter wants to watch his vitals constantly to take down any notes and changes that he possibly can.

Scorpius goes to visit him every other day, whether it be with his mother and grandmother, or M.W. Potter. He doesn't look much better, and seems to sleep more often than he's awake. M.W. Potter says that's normal though.

The potions are coursing through his blood system and fighting with the poison. It's bound to take a lot out of a man.

Scorpius is grateful that M.W. Potter lets him know what's going on. He may only be fifteen, but he wants to know. He likes feeling hope that his father will get better and the medi-wizard seems confidant in his work. M.W. Potter says that his friend in Germany may have found the compound responsible for his father's health; they only need a few more months and a few more blood samples to be sure.

His grandmother drops him off at King's Cross, and waves jovially at his friends as they come to gather him. When James and Lily reach him, she takes a few things out of her robes' pocket and hand them to the two of them, saying promptly, "It isn't much, but we do appreciate all of you."

When James' leads him to the compartment Hugo has secured for them, he and Lily pass out the little gifts and they all open them together, pulling small glass structures out of the wrapping.

James stares at his from his place next to Scorpius. "What is it?"

He takes James' hand and leads it and the glass structure up to the light, explaining, "They're like those little commercial-things you were telling me about. You hold them in the light and…"

"Wow," Albus says, watching whatever his glass structure beholds for him.

Scorpius watches James' with him, watching the compartment's light dance through the rainbow glass. It's a large cat, a panther probably, in a jungle and it slinks through the trees before looking at them curiously.

.hphphp.

The rest of the year passes without consequence.

Their O.W.L.'s are a cause for stress between Scorpius, Rose, and Albus, but they pass with only a few minor breakdowns. They make it through and celebrate with a loud outing to Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, where George makes the store up and has all assortments of candies waiting for them just like he did for James last year.

Scorpius finds himself spending quite a bit more in his tutoring sessions with James as well, trying to determine what he's feeling and if he should study his emotions further. He knows that he enjoys his time with the older boy, but otherwise…

He's still completely lost about that.

James seems to be around when he's needed and gone when Scorpius only wants to be alone. He can make Scorpius feel better, makes him laugh when he just wants to lash out at everyone. It's a strange thing that he just wishes would make more sense.

His mother picks him up from King's Cross in June, and he hugs all of his friends goodbye.

It's not until he feels his heart pound harshly in his chest as James hugs him and presses something into his hand that he thinks he understands his emotions.


	6. Chapter 6

The day before Scorpius returns for to Hogwarts, he sits down at his father's bedside. St. Mungo's has given him his own room, and it's been made up quite comfortably, seeing as his last several months have been spent there under the strict supervision of M.W. Potter. He has a comfortable bed, so many books around, his papers that are of importance to the orphanages and charities.

Some part of Scorpius knows there must be papers about wills, lands, and bank accounts that his father considers in the throes of his darker moods, but he prefers not to think about that, if at all possible.

He settles into the comfortable chair that always rests at his father's bedside, and tries not to let the depression sink in. His father is quite pale now. His mother teases him tearfully sometimes and says he's practically see through.

.Scorpius has never seem his mother look so sad as she has these last few months his father has been in St. Mungo's.

She isn't wrong though. His father is nearly clear, his skin is thin and his veins stand out like drunken maps to Elysium. His hair is almost clear, too; no longer blond with the faintest traces of silver. Just colorless.

Scorpius wonders if M.W. Potter is running another experimental process on his father, seeing if he can create the first truly invisible man.

His father is asleep most of the time Scorpius visits, but he doesn't mind. He settles in with his book and reads most of the afternoon, greeting the medi-wizard who comes in every four hours to make sure his father takes his potions. That's rather humorous as well, seeing as his father glares and M.W. Potter like a petulant five year old every time the medi-wizard demands, "Drink it_ all_, Malfoy."

A few times, his father gathers a book and reads with him, but the potions take more and more out of his father.

That's a good thing, they say. His father's body is weeding out toxins and the potions he's using don't give back much energy so much as they force the body to fight. The fact that he's tired means his body is fighting hard.

He stands to ready for his trip to King's Cross tomorrow. His grandmother doesn't like last minute scurries so he'd like to be as ready as he can. He stops suddenly when his father's hand reaches for him and takes it gently in his own, afraid he will breaks his father's thin fingers.

"Death is a sudden visitor," he says in a tinny voice. "If I don't make it to Christmas…"

"You'll be fine, father," Scorpius tries to reassure.

"Scorpius…my sweet son, I just want you to know that I love you…and that I am very proud of you."

On impulse he leans down to press his lips to his father's forehead, saying just as sincerely, "I love you too, father. I'll see you at Christmas."

He's positive he will.

.hphphp.

His mother comes to Hogwarts every Saturday to be with him.

At first he's not entirely sure what to do with her. She's his mother yes, but he's always been closer to his father. His father spent time with him and played with him. His mother would watch from the gardens and sometimes he thinks he remembers that she used to laugh at them, but he isn't sure.

As more Saturdays come and go, however, he feels himself beginning a tentative relationship with her. She asks about more than his schoolwork finally. She asks him about his friends, his hobbies, and if…if he's found himself any romance.

He tries to answer all of her questions honestly, but he's not sure how to do so at times.

The Greengrasses have always had different views on life. They weren't part of the second war like the Malfoys were. They didn't choose a side, but merely moved to Australia to live with family members there. The Greengrasses are still proud and somewhat pretentious.

Scorpius isn't sure what she thinks of his friends or how they're all half-bloods. He's not sure what his mother thinks about his growing fascination in Muggle Studies or Herbology. And he's not sure what she thinks about his lack of romantic life.

He doesn't know if he'll ever feel comfortable enough to tell her that he's not really interested in females beyond friendly companionship.

If she doesn't approve of him, she hides it rather well. She smiles, and though Scorpius detects that it's just a little fake, he thinks a good majority of it is real.

She begins to tell him stories. Stories he never knew about, like her time at Hogwarts before she even knew his father that well. She tells him about some of the troubles she found herself in, which aren't as bad as his father's troubles, but still humorous as she begins to reveal the pranks she and her sister pulled on each other.

He can't imagine Aunt Daphne spelling ink wells to sing sappy, wizarding love songs every time Mr. Zabini walked by. Aunt Daphne is the epitome of proper, but it's funny nonetheless.

And she tells him about his father, too. She reminisces about his father when he was young and the scars of the war were fresh on his body and mind. She tells him about the man she loved and loves, and smiles small smiles that he remembers vaguely from his childhood, before his parents were so busy with their businesses and used to spend holidays together instead of at galas.

It strikes him that Astoria Malfoy is changing just as much as he is what with his father in St. Mungo's.

.hphphp.

James still helps him with his potions despite the fact that he has his N.E.W.T.s to worry about. Of course, this year, it has somehow become a group study hour, which has, naturally turned into gossip session that has turned into a sparring lesson.

Lily and Albus are once again griping at each other, this time over the merits of Albus' new girlfriend, Abigail Lynch, who apparently Lily hates with a fiery passion.

"She's not even smart!" she proclaims, her quill fluttering angrily in her small fingers. "Honestly, I realize you're male and only have enough braincells to power on thought at a time, but Lady preserve me, you git, couldn't you have found a girl to date that had enough brain power for the both of you? I have O.W.L.s this year and I can feel my I.Q. shrinking every time that floozy is around me."

"Like you're attempts at dating have been any better?" Albus shoots back. "Shall we name off your love-struck puppies who didn't know how to string a full sentence together they were panting after you so hard?"

They glare at each other, and Rose without looking up from helping her brother with his Charms, says, "Children, remember you're loving siblings. You cannot kill each other."

"Ah, but no one said anything about maiming!" James says, guiding Scorpius' hand while he cuts gently at his newt's eye until he feels the younger has the hang of the small strokes. "Honestly, Rose, I don't see how you can even try to tame their juvenile acts. They will always be at each other's throats."

"Oi! Did anyone ask you, pillock?" Albus glares.

James looks affronted from what Scorpius can see out of the corner of his eye, but the heavy door of the classroom they always find themselves in swings open to reveal two figures.

"Mr. Malfoy," Headmistress McGonagall says, her face set grimly as his mother hovers tearfully behind her. "You're mother has come to collect you for a few days."

Scorpius feels the blood drain out of his face and cuts himself with the knife before James snatches it from his hand.

.hphphp.

His father has multiple organ failure. His body had been trying so hard to fight off the poison coursing through his veins and his kidney's shut down, soon followed by his liver, his pancreas. The medi-wizards and witches have a respiration spell over him, to keep his lungs going.

One of M.W. Potter's associates relay this to his grandmother and Scorpius, while his mother and father speak to M.W. Potter about options, possible procedures or medicines he could take until Potter's colleague in Germany can definitively pinpoint the poison in his father's bloodstream.

Scorpius sneaks closer to the room, slinking away from his grandmother, whose full attention is on the woman in front of her, demanding answers for questions that probably don't have any. He can understand why, he thinks. His father is his grandmother's one and only baby. It's definitely not fair to her that he should be in there and not her.

The door to his father's room is somewhat open, and he can see his father on the same bed he was in before Scorpius left of his Sixth Year. His mother has pressed herself in as close as she can to him on the mattress and with her face pressed gently against his skull running her hand through his lifeless hair, lovingly stroking it. At the seat beside them, M.W. Potter sits, looking at his father sadly.

They're silent and Scorpius has the horrible feeling his father has died before he had the chance to say goodbye, but then his father speaks, low and quiet. "I always hoped I would make it to my son's graduation."

M.W. Potter nodded, an understanding smile on his face. "I could make that happen."

His father snorts and rolls his eyes, which are just barely open. "I know you can. You have a hero complex the size of Russia."

His mother sniffles a little and murmurs, "Draco, darling…please…"

His father and the medi-wizard share grim smiles, like two people who have accepted what his mother is still trying to deny. M.W. Potter swallows a little and looks down at his hands, which hang limply between his knees. "It wouldn't be painless. I can almost guarantee you'd be in pain more often than not."

Scorpius feels a hard lump forming in the back of his throat and his vision goes blurry at the thought of his father in any more pain.

His father only grunts. "It would be worth it, though. To see Scorpius…" He can't contain the sniffle at his father's word and the sick man opens his eyes and narrows them towards the door. "Scorpius."

He wipes his face with the sleeve of his robe, which he only now realizes has the guts of the potion he and James had been working on together. He collects himself as best he can, telling himself his father had warned him this could happen and that he was prepared for it.

When he comes through the door, he takes a deep breath and before his parents or M.W. Potter can say anything, he whispers, "I don't want you to be in pain, father," feeling like a five-year-old when more tears poor down his already reddened cheeks.

His father only smiles sadly at him.

.hphphp.

He tells his friends what's going on when he returns to Hogwarts much later that night. He tells them he'll be leaving for St. Mungo's every night until his family has made a decision, or at the very least explored all the options. He tells them that his father has little to no chance away from St. Mungo's, but that he's determined to make it until Scorpius graduates. He explains that both his mother and grandmother want to keep him alive as long as possible until the group of physicians can find something to help him.

He admits that he gave his father permission to die, painless and without regret.

Lily and Rose shed tears with him and pull him close to them, holding him tightly. James, Albus, and Hugo offer what support they can, resting their hands against his back to show that they're all there for him.

When they've all calmed down, Albus asks quietly, "Do you think he would mind if we visited him?"

Scorpius' head jerks up, confused. It's Hugo who continues the thought however. "We've never met your father. We would like to…if you think he's up to it."

His heart soars and sinks at the same time. Somehow this puts it all into perspective. His friends want to meet his father now before he's expired into death's clutches. He doesn't know whether to smile or yell that it's all not true, but he nods.

"I'll see what can be done."

He feels a hand squeeze at his shoulder, and knows who it is without looking.

.hphphp.

"Do you remember what I told you just before your first year?" his father asks after his friends have filed out of the room at M.W. Potter's demand.

It had been a lovely little visit, but it was easy for Scorpius to see how many pain potions his father had taken to be able to stand even a fifteen minute visit. He isn't sure how M.W. Potter keeps his father from overdosing with all the empty vials that are by his bed.

Scorpius nods a little, taking a seat in the comfortable chair. "You told me to be myself."

His father's boney finger points towards the door, where he can still hear the faintest traces of James telling his father that they're all 'going to wait, and if he could tell Scorpius, please…' A small smile graces his father's lips. "I'm so glad you listened."

A few nights later, M.W. Potter has Scorpius and his mother and grandmother leave the room immediately when he sees his father's face drain of color before contorting in pain. Even through the door there are the sounds of retching, and Potter can be heard trying to relax his father enough to take a multitude of potions.

His mother and grandmother whisper broken-heartedly and his grandmother cries for what is probably the first time Scorpius has ever seen. They agree to see about convincing his father to listen to Scorpius.

.hphphp.

His father goes painlessly just after New Year. M.W. Potter administers painkillers, and heavy sleeping potions and removes all the spells keeping his father alive. His mother sits in the bed with his father relaxing against her chest as she runs her fingers through his hair, and Scorpius and his grandmother each hold one of his thin hands.

He looks peaceful, yet still sad when the medi-wizard calls his time of death.

The funeral is held at Malfoy Manor and there are more people there than Scorpius knows what to do with, despite the fact he has met most of them.

The Potter family comes, as do Rose and Hugo's family, and all his friends give him strong hugs afterwards.

He hardly feels any of it. It's strange to think of his father as gone. He told his father everything, or everything he could. He can't imagine never speaking to him again, or reading with him, or going to the orphanages with him…

M.W. Potter comes by at one point and hands him a slim, little gift.

"I'm sorry I couldn't do more for him," he says softly, his green eyes dark with pain. "He really was a good man."

Scorpius could have told him that years ago, but he unwraps the gift carefully.

"My children said you collect Chocolate Frog cards. I know it isn't much but…"

Scorpius finally takes the wrapping away and in his hands is a little card, exactly like his others, but his father's face stares up at him with a smile he knows so well.

"Ginny and I had it made for you a few months ago. It won't be properly distributed, but I convinced the makers to at least do this for you."

He stares at the little card, and feels a small smile on his face. He laughs a little and asks, "How did you get him to smile?"

His father has never smiled for any pictures.

M.W. Potter gives a small upturn of his lips, telling him quietly, "I told him it was for you."

.hphphp.

James comes into the library at the end of May, and sits down tiredly across from Scorpius.

Scorpius is doing a strange combination of looking over his Charms notes for his final tomorrow and running over some paperwork that his grandmother sent him. He doesn't want to take over the orphanages full time. He's N.E.W.T.s will actually be in Herbological Research, next year. However, he's not going to let the family's hard work fall to the wayside, and he has always been as fond of the children at the orphanages.

He glances up at James, who's sprawled in his chair with his head tipped back. He looks to be sleeping, but Scorpius knows better. "How was your last N.E.W.T.?" he asks quietly as Madam Pince is only a few aisles away putting up her precious books.

"I'm pretty sure I put half of my soul into that Runes test," James grumps. "If I don't get an E, I'm going to be very put out."

Scorpius hums his understanding, looking at something in his notes for Charms while James relaxes as much as he can in an uncomfortable library chair. After several minutes, James rearranges and looks over the documents Scorpius' grandmother sent, a frown furrowing between his red brows.

"Do you actually understand this?" he asks, tilting his head to the side as if it will make the words become clearer to him.

Scorpius smiles fondly at him. "Yes, a good amount. Father and mother usually always kept me up to date on their business ventures. Father would explain as best he could what he was doing with his charities and orphanages so that if some of the younger patrons asked I would be able to explain it simply."

James makes a small noise of understanding as he puts his elbows on the table. "Remind me to take all my legal documents to you before signing."

"I doubt that will be a hardship for you."

He just grins and shrugs before they settle back into silence for several minutes on end. He seems to be on the edge of falling asleep several times, but Scorpius usually manages to nudge his shoe before Madam Pince can see him.

After the fourth time, he begins to slouch, Scorpius kicks him in the shin…hard.

James grunts and glares before rubbing tiredly at his eyes. "Merlin's beard, it's been a long year."

Scorpius nods, thinking of his father and everything that went on separately from that. "It has." He stares into James' warm, brown eyes, feeling his heart stir the way it normally does. He reaches into his pocket for the trinket James had given him before he went home last summer and sets it on the table. "Thank you for being there for me."

James barely flicks his eyes towards the mobile phone on the table, before smiling softly and taking Scorpius' hand.

"My pleasure."

.hphphp.

The ride home is loud as it always is with the Potters and the Weasleys.

James is settled on one side of Scorpius locked in a serious debate on who James should apply for apprenticeship with, discussing the merits of each Potions Master seriously and adding up the cons for them on sheets of paper they've attached to the applications.

Rose is on his other side, with Lily's head resting in her lap as the younger girl sleeps. Hugo sits beside Albus on the other bench, with his girlfriend of two weeks who is also a Hufflepuff and looks over her head each time James or Albus raise their voices.

She looks like he felt the first time he was trapped in the same compartment with them, unsure of what to say, but still enjoying their company.

He hugs each of them in turn at King's Cross and says he'll come see them in two weeks to see an amateur game that Lily and Albus have been on about.

When he gets to James, he smiles deviously and waves, mobile phone in his palm as he trots to meet his mother and grandmother.

It was a bad year, and he still misses his father and isn't sure what to do with his mother, but he'll get through it.

He's positive he will.


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: Last chapter, folks. Hope you enjoyed it and that this makes up for me being a horrible, evil author.

.hphphp.

The summer before his Seventh Year, all his friends come over to the Manor. They surprise him with a cake that carefully has 'Happy Birthday, Draco,' spelled out in dark green frosting.

He stares at it for long seconds as his mother and grandmother come up behind him, before looking up at Hugo, who holds the cake, and then around the group in the Entrance Hall, finally resting on James.

He thinks back to their conversation, so many years ago when he was thirteen and didn't know that his father was even going to die.

"_On his and Uncle George's birthday grandma Weasley makes two cakes and we take the second one out to the tree he's buried under and smother his tree with the cake."_

He looks down at the cake one more time, before saying definitively, "We are not smearing my father's sarcophagus with cake." He's almost positive he hears his mother make a strangled noise and his grandmother stifle a snort of disdain.

James smiles and steps around the crowd to sooth Scorpius. "No, no. That's for Uncle Fred." This time his mother does let out a strangled sound. "However, we thought that perhaps, sharing the cake with him wouldn't be that bad."

Scorpius looks back at his mother and his grandmother, who stand side by side. "What do you think?" he asks, because this could be good for them too. They haven't exactly been themselves lately, immersing themselves in their work. Scorpius thinks it would be very good for them.

His mother straightens when her opinion is asked, and she brushes out her robes. She gives his grandmother an appraising look and seems to decide her answer as well. She smiles primly. "Yes, I think an outing to…to visit…your father would be lovely." That sentence is getting easier for her to say, but it still sticks sadly to her tongue. "Let us get ready?"

They all nod and within fifteen minutes they've all made their way down to the Malfoy memorial, which lays several acres behind the Manor. They find his father's sarcophagus easily, and his mother moves away any debris that has fallen since their last visit.

Hugo sets the cake down on a quickly transfigured table, and his Scorpius calls Gilly to grab plates and cutlery. When he returns, it's with Scramble, who moves around his father's grave, loving on the corners with her face.

His mother takes a bite of the homemade cake, and makes a contented noise in the back of her throat. "This is quite good. Which of you made this?"

The Weasleys and Potters' eyes travel pointedly to Lily, who shrinks under the stare.

"It's very good. How did you know lemon was Draco's favorite?" his grandmother asks, taking a lady-like bite from her fork.

This time Lily looks at James expectantly, who gives them all a nervous blush. "Lucky guess."

Scorpius smiles a little to himself and takes another bit of the cake. His eyes move over to his father's grave and he watches his cat, who's now on top of the sarcophagus and licking at the icing. He considers flicking her down, and then pretends not to notice her. She isn't disturbing the corner piece that had been carefully placed aside for his father.

That's all the matters right now.

.hphphp.

The ride to his final year of Hogwarts is still loud. Even without James there to cause mayhem, there are still two Potter siblings hounding at each other.

Albus and Lily are in the midst of arguing who's smarter out of the two of them. No one dare intervene on this one, not even Rose, who looks as if she's trying very hard not to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Scorpius can understand why, though. Their argument is completely half-hearted and there are long pauses between each barb, as if they're waiting for something.

Finally, Lily huffs and throws herself back against her seat. "This is hard to keep up without James here to help."

Albus nods. "Tell me about it. I'm used to him sticking his nose into everything."

Scorpius smiles and considers sending one of those nifty text messages to the older man to tell him what his siblings said, but he figures James has a big enough ego. Instead, he pets Scramble, who has plastered herself against his thigh.

Beverly looks at them confusedly, like she can't believe that was an act and Hugo holds her hand gently.

Scorpius begins a letter to his father after the Welcoming Feast, even though he won't be able to send it.

It's just something he's always done.

.hphphp.

Professor Longbottom looks glad for the company when Scorpius enters Greenhouse four after a small search for the man.

"Scorpius!" he says with a welcoming smile, setting down a large pot that has a thick vine reaching out to pet his hair. "It's good to see you. How was your summer?" he asks as he comes close, looking worried and sad for him.

Scorpius just shrugs a little, answers honestly, "It was…different. I'm still not quite used to meals without my father, or anything without my father to be honest, but it wasn't a horrible as I had once imagined. And James and the others came over for his birthday to celebrate with us. That was very nice."

Professor Longbottom nods. "James and the others can be very thoughtful like that," he says innocently, but it doesn't stop the flush from crawling on his face when he specifies James the way Scorpius did.

When he returns to his dorm, he pulls out a new parchment and begins a new letter to his father outlining the growing relationship he now shares with the Potions apprentice.

.hphphp.

He's studying with Albus when Alex St. Croix comes into the library.

Ever since their third year, Alex has done his best to ignore Scorpius, treating him like he doesn't exist, so it's rather shocking to hear his name loudly whispered from the other Ravenclaw's lips. Both he and Albus look up; Scorpius from shock and Albus glaring dangerously.

Alex slows his trek around the table when he sees the Slytherin's glower, but clears his throat, looking nervous. He stands in front of their note piled table and stares at Scorpius in between his long stares at their studies.

Albus rolls his eyes, clearly unimpressed by Alex's silent fidgeting. "You missed your chance, St. Croix. He's seeing someone."

Scorpius whirls his eyes around to his friend and hisses, "Excuse you!"

He just shrugs disinterestedly. "You are."

Alex speaks up finally while Scorpius is glaring at Albus, asking, "Do you mind if we go out to the hall?"

Scorpius stares at his friend, noticing the way Albus' ears perk up at the mention of the hall. He sighs. "As long as you don't mind an eavesdropper."

He stands and grabs his satchel—he's hardly left it anywhere without someone to watch it and he knows Albus is going to be right behind them—motioning for Alex to lead them to the hall. When he's sure they're away from the earshot of most library, and that Albus can still hear without standing right next to Alex ominously, he asks, "What can I help you with, Alex?"

His dormmate clears his throat nervously, before looking at the ground. "I, er, I wanted to say I was sorry."

"Pardon me?" Scorpius asks quickly to cover the somewhat loud snort from the library entrance.

"I'm sor…look, I know that you may not believe this and left to my own devices I probably wouldn't have the guts to actually say this, but…" he pauses and looks over at the door where Albus isn't even trying to look like he's hiding. He lowers his voice marginally and leans in towards Scorpius. "Lately, I've been trying to gain the attentions of your friend…"

"I'm straight!" Albus inserts.

"Your female friend," Alex growls, clearly growing annoyed. "Rose," he clarifies. "And she won't look at me. She says that after what I did to you…and I agree! I do. I was horrible to you when we were younger and I wish I could make it up to…and I never said it, but I was very sorry to hear about your father last year…"

"Alex, breathe." Scorpius puts his hand on the other boys shoulder, afraid he may pass out soon if he doesn't take a breath.

He does as he's instructed and starts again. "I just wanted to tell you how sincerely I regret the way I acted to you."

Scorpius searches his face over, still sees some of the same boy who tormented him for nearly three years, but mostly he sees a man trying to change. He remembers how Alex didn't see past his father's past indiscretions, and continued to see the past in Scorpius.

He takes a deep breath, looking back at Albus, whose parents had been the direct victims of his family's mistakes, and sees a friend looking back, a friend who had never judged him. A friend who currently has his brow quirked impatiently.

Scorpius gives a small, half-smile and returns his gaze to Alex. He offers his hand, with a polite, "I'll put a good word in for you."

Alex takes his hand.

Later that afternoon, he begins yet another letter to his father, finally admitting that he had been terrorized as a younger student; recounting how Rose had tried to stick with him his first year; how he had been defended by Lily when he was only a Second Year; and finally how all of his friend had used some crazy battle strategy to defend and finally ward off bullies in this Third Year. He writes about how second chances are pivotal, just like his father had always told him.

.hphphp.

He spends most of his Holidays with his mother and grandmother, and they attend to a party at one of the orphanages. A few of the older kids take a few minutes to say how they miss his father, but mostly they try to keep it light for the children as they open a few of their gifts one Christmas Eve.

His mother smiles at him, and takes his hand in his as they leave the house, and she presses a small gift into his hand. He looks down at it. They almost never personally open gifts before Christmas morning, but she nods her head encouragingly. "Go on, Scorpius."

He opens the wrapping and a small velvet box falls into open palm. He stares at it for a few minutes, before prying the lid open, looking at his mother curiously.

"Your father was planning to give it to you this Christmas," she says as she takes the paper out of his hand and banishes it away.

His grandmother comes up behind him, gently takes the box from his lax fingers and removes the ring with the Malfoy insignia on it. "It's been in the family for generations. It's your turn to wear it," she says putting the ring on the middle finger of his right hand. She smiles, her blue eyes misting slightly the way his mother's were.

For New Year's he goes over to the Potters house where they're already celebrating loudly. It seems that half of the redheaded population is trapped inside they're large-but-large-enough house. He's traded between all of his friends to meet the Weasley grandparents, the curse-breaking Weasleys, the dragon-taming Weasley, and the ministry Weasleys.

He thanks his family for being so social. He has no problem remembering names.

He sees George and his family and waves to the triple W's owner genially. He tells Ginny and Harry about his studies and his hopes of becoming a Herbological Researcher. Ron and Hermione even stop to speak with him though he's only seen them once or twice.

There are some other families there, some other people that James—when James finally pries him away from Lily—points out, like his god-brother, Teddy, who's married to Victiore and the father of their young girl, Dora. Alex St. Croix is hovering around Rose nervously, looking around the loud crowd nervously, while Ron—Scorpius has given up the 'Mr' and Mrs's—glares ominously. James has a bet with Albus to see how long it takes him to break. Beverly and her family are also there, and Beverly seems to be settling in really well these days, because she flitters between some of the younger cousins, Hugo, and her parents.

Five minutes to midnight, James pulls him away from the crowd and into his room, they touch gently and have whispered conversations in the dark room until they hear the enthused countdown from the living room. As the crowd shouts 'Happy New Year!' James presses Scorpius into his bed-dressings and kisses him sweetly.

.hphphp.

Rose and Lily once again decide it's time for a picnic, and more importantly, a break from Rose, Albus, and Scorpius' constant studying, but they force everyone to wander into Hogsmeade this time, saying they'll grab food from the Three Broomsticks. Albus grumbles and Alex looks pleased to be invited.

Hugo and Beverly move ahead, holding hands.

When they enter Three Broomsticks there's a loud shout of 'Happy Birthday!' that forces Scorpius to cover his ears and look around in shock.

His mother and grandmother are there with his Aunt Daphne. James is there, too, and his mother. He's surprised to see Professor Longbottom smiling next to Ginny. Lily laughs at his shocked face and loops her arm around his waist. "It dawned on us all that we never really had a party for your birthdays!" she laughs pulling him into the throng of people that he's acquainted with from school. "It seemed a right shame, so we decided to go all out for your eighteenth."

She takes him to his mother and grandmother, and trades kisses to the cheek with each of them in a way he never would have guessed she would. His grandmother smiles as she walks away, and leans in to whisper, "If anyone asks we came for the cake."

He and his mother laugh at her, knowing how much she's enjoyed having excuses to have Lily bake for her.

James finds him shortly after Lily leaves to bring out the cake, and he's talking with Hugo and Beverly, trying to decipher how they managed to keep it secret, especially Beverly, who Scorpius has learned, is the worst secret-keeper ever.

Scorpius looks over his shoulder at the man, who has his hand on his waste. He doesn't move away but he does look around for his family. They've never really been a big secret to James' family, but he's curious to see what his own family might think. He finds his mother's gaze easily and she looks curious, but when she realizes she's been caught staring she smiles and it's only marginally forced.

Scorpius is beginning to think that maybe there can be some things he can share with his mother.

It's solidified when James licks the back of his hand, causing Scorpius to snatch his hand back in disgust, and his mother's laughter is the loudest he hears.

His father was right. Scorpius had always just needed to be himself.

.hphphp.

By the time his N.E.W.T.s are over and graduation has arrived for he, Albus, and Rose, everything feels like it's completely smoothed out.

His father is gone, and that won't ever completely stop hurting. He still has a loving family, though, with a mother whose he's slowly beginning to understand and who's showing more interest in spending time with him. He has wonderful friends, who are loud and a little crazy, but fiercely protective.

And he has James, who whispers in his ear when he's hugging Scorpius in congratulations, "I bet your father is so proud of you right now."

It's a sort of paradise.

.hphphp.

InnocentGuilt


End file.
